Birthdays, in my
opinion, are a time to hit the life reset button. It’s like you get a chance to
restart your whole year. With our
birthdays being so close to the New Year, (2 days on either side, Dec 30 and
Jan 2), and the rest of the world feeling like it’s a new beginning ,Ian and I,
get to reset along with everyone else. I know, I know, sounds so cliché.
We decided to take a trip to Mafia Island, off the coast of
Tanzania, to go swimming with the whale sharks.
We hop on the 6am bus to Dar Es Salaam, take a room for the
night and back up at 4:30am to catch a taxi and another 6am bus to the
coast.
The bus gets in late, and we find ourselves stranded in a
little fishing village on the river, our ferry has already left, and it’s the only
one for the day. We’re gonna have to
spend the night in this little village that reeks of fish. Standing in the middle of the road looking
around we take in the entire village, and I’m not kidding when I say this. We find the one English speaker of the
village and he helps us get a room for the night. We
make the best of it, go to the New Corner Pub for fish and rice, the only thing
on the menu, and sit at the town square watching the young guys play pool for a
while. We started chatting it up with the locals who were under the impression
that Ian was my boyfriend… haha!! I may look young, but not that young. We
decided to take a nap, we were tired, and
we had been up early for the past 2 mornings, something we are definitely not
used to.
The day and night, were sweltering. We were right on the river and hoped sleeping
with the door to our room open would provide us a cross breeze… no such luck.
The next morning we stood watching the villagers load and
unload the ferry that would take us to Mafia Island; it did not meet the
definitions of a ferry, but was much closer to being a medium sized boat. The refrigerators
that were being used as benches the
night before were still laying flat on
their backs, but were now being packed with ice and loaded with crabs, prawns and
fish to be taken to the markets in Dar Es Salaam.
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| our ferry to Mafia Island |
Once the boat was
loaded with many goodies from the main land it was our turn to get on board and
find a seat. We noticed many people getting
on and laying on the floor but didn’t know why.
Turns out what we thought was going to be a 2 hour crossing was closer
to 5. The people lying on the floor got
a chance to take a nap and did not have to encounter the uncomfortable wooden
benches. As we looked out over the side
of the boat, we saw what we thought was the horizon, except it kept getting
closer and closer. Turns out there was
a line of muddy water, separated by a line of blue water from the Indian Ocean.
It was as if someone had drawn a line
that neither waters from the river or the ocean was willing to cross. We also encountered
dolphins and were escorted for a few meters with a front row seat to watch as
they jumped and flipped out of the water swimming alongside our boat. About 90 mins into our boat ride Ian started
to feel a bit sea sick, thank God for homeopathic Tabacum, it helped in
settling his stomach.
Although a day later than we anticipated, we got to our
hotel and were grateful for the hot shower and air condition. We needed some comfort
after the past couple day’s hard travel.
Headed out to sea by 8am Tuesday morning it turned out to be
one of the few mornings the weather was overcast, this coming on the heels of 2
months of steamy hot rainless weather.
The seas were rough, but this Island girl was hell bent on dipping her
toes in the water, after all, it’s not New Years if you haven’t had a sea bath.
Wind kicking up and waves fit more for surfing than boating we made our way out
to deeper waters to look for whale sharks. Only a few minutes out our guide starts puking
over the side, the boat spings a leak and the Captain’s bailing water while the
first mate is trying to plug the hole.
It was comical even though it could have been dire.
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| fishing boats getting ready to go out on the waters |
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| our boat with the waves breaking and splashing over the side |
We kept an eye out for fins breaching the water hoping to
see the whale sharks we were pursuing. I saw dorsal fins popping up and yelled
to the Captain to turn in that direction. We were all excited and he said “Today you get
the prize for finding the whales sharks”, but it was only dolphins, their heads bobbing up out
of the waves, not jumping or flipping today just swimming like they had someplace
they were hurrying off to, so we kept looking. We stayed out on the water for 5
hours searching for whale sharks with no luck.
Not to be totally disappointed we jumped overboard and
attempted to swim and snorkel out on the open waters and were fortunate enough
to see some corals. After only a few
mins in Ian and I both climbed back on the boat, the water was too rough, it
was knocking us around like a lone sock in a tumble dryer, and it was no fun.
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| Ian swimming in open water |
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waves crashing over Ian with the Captain swimming nearby |
So, we were disappointed, but as Ian says, “You don’t always
get what you want,” and what we wanted were whale sharks. For a teen he’s very
insightful.
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| close quarter's on the plane |
Next day it’s time to head home and we find out the ferry is
broken and MAYBE would be fixed and
leaving the following morning. With no guarantees we decided to fly back to
Dar-Es-Salaam on a tiny 12 seater plane, where you could reach out and touch
the pilot, and make our way back home to our cozy lil house. Our vacation was a bit more effort than it was
worth, but it was still good to get down to the coast and dip our toes in the
water.
